Question testing and implementation
ONS's Sexual Identity Project aims to develop a question (or set of questions) that can be used on social surveys and for equality monitoring purposes. It is important that questioning is developed where possible to meet user requirements, is acceptable to respondents and can be administered on a social survey. Once an acceptable question is developed it will be added to the Integrated Household Survey (IHS), which combines most ONS household surveys into one. This will allow for experimental estimates of the size and characteristics of the lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) populations to be produced and evaluated.
Testing of potential questions on sexual identity will be achieved by:
- trials on the National Statistics Omnibus Survey, and
- cognitive tests
Documentation relating to implementation issues will include:
- a General Household Survey longitudinal (GSL) split sample trial
- a report on proxy response issues, and
- the likely precision of estimates in relation to sexual identity produced by the IHS
